Brigham–Kanner Property Rights Prize

Frank I. Michelman (2004)

Professor Frank I. Michelman was chosen in large measure for his influential article, "Property, Utility, and Fairness: Comments on the Ethical Foundations of ‘Just Compensation’ Law", 80 Har.L. Rev. 1165 (1967). He is the author of Brennan and Democracy, Rights and Democracy in a Transformative Constitution, and Constitutional Property Clauses: A Comparative Analysis. He is Robert Walmsley University Professor, Emeritus, at Harvard University, where he taught from 1963 to 2012. He has published widely in the fields of property law, constitutional law, and government law. Professor Michelman is a fellow of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences and a past President (1994-1995) of the American Society for Political and Legal Philosophy. He has served on the Committee of Directors for the annual Prague Conference on Philosophy and the Social Sciences, the Board of Directors of the United States Association of Constitutional Law, and the National Advisory Board of the American Constitution Society.

Richard A. Epstein (2005)

Professor Richard A. Epstein is the James Parker Hall Distinguished Service Professor of Law at the University of Chicago where he also serves as director of the John M. Olin Program in Law and Economics. He is known for his research and writing in a broad range of constitutional, economic, historical, and philosophical subjects.He edited the Journal of Legal Studies (1981–91) and the Journal of Law and Economics (1991–2001). He is now a director of its Olin Program in Law and Economics. Epstein's books include How the Progressives Rewrote the Constitution (2006); Free Markets under Siege: Cartels, Politics and Social Welfare (Hoover Institution Press, 2005), Skepticism and Freedom: A Modern Case for Classical Liberalism (2003); Principles for a Free Society: Reconciling Individual Liberty with the Common Good (1998); Mortal Peril: Our Inalienable Right to Health Care? (1997); Simple Rules for a Complex World (1995); Bargaining with the State (1993); Forbidden Grounds: The Case against Employment Discrimination Laws (1992); and Takings: Private Property and the Power of Eminent Domain (1985).

James W. Ely (2006)

Professor James W. Ely is Milton R. Underwood Professor of Law, Emeritus, and Professor of History, Emeritus at Vaderbilt University. He has written about a wide range of topics in legal history and is the author of The Guardian of Every Other Right: A Constitutional History of Property Rights, The Fuller Court: Justices, Rulings and Legacy, and Railroads and American Law. Ely served as assistant editor of the American Journal of Legal History from 1987 to 1999.

Margaret Jane Radin (2007)

Professor Margaret Jane Radin is the Henry King Ransom Professor of Law at the University of Michigan Law School and Faculty of Law Distinguished Research Scholar at the University of Toronto. Prior to joining the Michigan faculty in fall 2007, she was the William Benjamin Scott and Luna M. Scott Professor of Law at Stanford University, and director of Stanford Law School's Program in Law, Science, and Technology. She also has been on the faculty of the University of Southern California Law Center and has been a visiting professor at UCLA, NYU, Berkelely, and Harvard. Radin has published prolifically on property rights theory and institutions, commodification, intellectual property, and cyber-law, as well as on contracts and legal theory. Highlights of her property scholarship include Contested Commoditites and Reinterpreting Property. Radin is a Fellow of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences.

Robert C. Ellickson (2008)

Professor Robert C. Ellickson is the Walter E. Meyer Professor of Property and Urban Law at Yale Law School. He is author of The Household: Informal Order Around the Hearth, Order Without Law: How Neighbors Settle Disputes, Land Use Controls (with Vicki L. Been), and Perspectives on Property Law (with Carol M. Rose and Bruce A. Ackerman). He is a fellow of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences and a past president of the American Law and Economics Association.

Richard E. Pipes (2009)

Professor Richard E. Pipes is the 2009 recipient of the Brigham–Kanner Property Rights Prize. He is the Frank B. Baird, Jr., Professor of History, Emeritus, at Harvard University. He served as National Security Council Director of East European and Soviet Affairs from 1981-82. His books include Formation of the Soviet Union: Communism and Nationalism, 1917-1923, Struve: Liberal on the Right, 1905-1944, The Russian Revolution, Property and Freedom, Communism: A History, and Vixi: The Memoirs Property and the Power of Eminent Domain. He was inducted into the American Academy of Arts and Sciences in 1985 and was awarded the Bradley Prize in 2011.

Carol M. Rose (2010)

Professor Carol M. Rose is the 2010 recipient of the Brigham–Kanner Property Rights Prize. She is the Lohse Chair in Water and Natural Resources professor at the University of Arizona James E. Rogers College of Law. From 1990 to 1994 Professor Rose was the Fred Johnston Chair in Property and Environmental Law, Yale Law School. She has been the author of titles such as "Property and Persuasion: Essays on the History, Theory, and the Rhetoric of Ownership" "Crystals and Mud in Property Law, 40 Stan. L. Rev. 577" and "Big Roads, Big Rights: Varieties of Public Infrastructure and Their Impact on Environmental Resources, 50 Ariz. L. Rev. 409 " among others. She is on the Board of Editors of the Foundation Press and is a member of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences.

Sandra Day O'Connor (2011)

Sandra Day O'Connor served as an associate justice of the Supreme Court of the United States from 1981 to 2006 and as Chancellor of the College of William & Mary from 2005 until 2011. In 2010, the William & Mary Law School faculty awarded her its highest honor, the Marshall-Wythe Medallion, in recognition of her exceptional accomplishments and leadership. She was awarded the Brigham-Kanner Property Rights Prize for her years of jurisprudence upholding private property rights. Her dissent in Kelo v. City of New London derided the implications of the majority's decision as a threat to the property rights of all private citizens. Justice O'Connor's acceptance speech urged the people of China and the United States to learn more about the other's property rights to improve relations.

James E. Krier (2012)

James E. Krier, the Earl Warren DeLano Professor of Law at the University of Michigan Law School, is the outstanding scholar on the evolution of American property rights. Fully recognizing that property rights are more than simple relationships between Kings and Princes spawned by the Magna Charta, Professor Krier comprehends the history of economic relations and behavioral conduct in an ever-changing society, recognizing that the study of property is a study of economics and societal action. Fully recognizing that property rights are intrinsic in our liberty, Professor Krier has cogently espoused the nature of change in personal relationships in both economic and non-economic circumstances and how they have modified the property rights relationship. He has clarified the intrinsic relationship of property rights and societal relations.

Thomas W. Merrill (2013)

Thomas W. Merrill is the Charles Evans Hughes Professor of Law at Columbia Law School, where he teaches property, torts, and administrative law. He previously taught at Northwestern University School of Law and Yale Law School. He clerked for the United States Supreme Court for Justice Harry Blackmun and served as Deputy Solicitor General from 1987 to 1990. He is the author of Property: Principles and Policies, The Oxford Introductions to U.S. Law: Takings, as well as numerous articles. He is a member of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences. Merrill received the Brigham–Kanner Property Rights Prize during the 10th Annual Brigham Kanner Property Rights Conference on October 18 and 19, 2013 at the William and Mary School of Law.

Michael M. Berger (2014)

Michael Berger is one of the top eminent domain and land use lawyers in the United States. His appellate practice at Manatt, Phelps & Phillips has involved condemnation, due process, and equal protection. He is the first practicing lawyer to receive the Brigham-Kanner Property Rights Prize and is considered by his peers to be among the best takings lawyers in the nation. Berger has argued numerous cases before the US Courts of Appeal and the United States Supreme Court. He was recognized for his contributions through his practice to the law of takings.

Joseph W. Singer (2015)

Joseph William Singer is the Bussey Professor of Law at Harvard Law School. In addition to a casebook and treatise on property law, he is the author of Entitlement: The Paradoxes of Property (Yale University Press, 2000), The Edges of the Field: Lessons on the Obligations of Ownership (Beacon Press, 2000), and No Freedom without Regulation: The Hidden Lesson of the Subprime Crisis (Yale University Press, forthcoming), and more than seventy law review articles. He has long been recognized as one of the nation's foremost theorists in property law.

Hernando de Soto (2016)

Hernando de Soto is the author of The Mystery of Capital: Why Capitalism Triumphs in the West and Fails Everywhere Else (Basic Books, 2000), The Other Path: The Economic Answer to Terrorism (Basic Books, 2002), which includes a new updated preface, "The Other Path after Ten Years," and Swiss Human Rights Book Volume 1: Realizing Property Rights (2006), co-authored with Francis Cheneval. De Soto's writing advocates the formalization of property rights as a means of combating poverty and terrorism. He has received numerous international recognitions and honors, including the Adam Smith Award from the Association of Private Enterprise Education, the Compass Award from BearingPoint, Inc.-Forbes Magazine, the CARE Canada Award for Outstanding Development Thinking, The Economist Magazine's Innovation Award, the Freedom Prize from the Max Schmidheiny Foundation, and the Milton Friedman Prize for Advancing Liberty from the CATO Institute.